Trump announces ‘complete and total’ ceasefire between Israel and Iran

Trump said the war could have gone on for years and destroyed the entire Middle East, “but it didn’t, and never will”.

He later told NBC News he believed the ceasefire was “unlimited” and would “go forever”. He said he did not think Israel and Iran “will ever be shooting at each other again”.

Reuters reported that Qatar Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani had secured Tehran’s agreement to the US ceasefire proposal during a call with Iranian officials held after the Iranian strikes on a US base in Qatar on Monday, citing an official briefed on the negotiations.

The phone call came after Trump told Qatar’s emir that Israel had agreed to the ceasefire and asked for Doha’s help persuading Tehran to also agree to the deal, the official said.

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Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese welcomed Trump’s announced ceasefire. “We have consistently called for dialogue, diplomacy and de-escalation,” he said in a statement.

Trump’s announcement came after Iran attacked America’s Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar in retaliation for the US’s weekend strikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities. The airbase hosts the Qatari, US and UK air forces, and the forward headquarters of US Central Command in the region.

Trump described Iran’s missile attack as a “very weak response” that the US had anticipated, but thanked Iran for giving advance warning, “which made it possible for no lives to be lost, and nobody to be injured”.

He also said: “Perhaps Iran can now proceed to peace and harmony in the region, and I will enthusiastically encourage Israel to do the same.”

Trump gave the number of Iranian retaliatory missiles as 14, and said 13 were “knocked down”, with one other “set free” as it was not heading in a threatening direction. “Most importantly, they’ve gotten it all out of their ‘system’, and there will, hopefully, be no further HATE.”

Qatar, however, said Iran had fired 19 missiles at the US air base and hit with one, but caused no casualties. Qatar’s Defence Ministry earlier said its defence systems intercepted the attack.

While there was no harm to humans, air travel was disrupted by the incident. Qantas was among the airlines forced to divert planes away from Qatari airspace, which was closed shortly before Iran’s missile attack.

Iran fired the missiles at Al Udeid early on Tuesday AEST, the regime’s first act of retaliation for the American bombardment of its nuclear facilities at the weekend.

In a statement, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps said the attack was a response to “the blatant military aggression by the criminal regime of the United States”.

It described the operation as “powerful and destructive”, said Iran “will never leave any aggression against its territorial integrity, sovereignty or national security unanswered”.

Built on a flat stretch of desert about 30 kilometres south-west of Qatar’s capital, Doha, Al Ubdeid is one of the most significant American military assets in the region.

The sprawling facility hosts thousands of US service members and served as a major staging ground for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. At the height of both, it housed some 10,000 US troops, but that number dropped to about 8000 as of 2022. Trump visited the base during his trip to Qatar last month and spoke to troops.

Last week, ahead of the US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites, many of the transport planes, fighter jets and drones typically on Al Udeid’s tarmac dispersed. In a June 18 satellite photo taken by Planet Labs and analysed by The Associated Press, the airbase’s tarmac had emptied.

The US hit Iran’s nuclear assets with 75 projectiles on the weekend, including 14 “bunker-buster” bombs aimed at obliterating the country’s ability to develop nuclear weapons, though the full extent of the damage is still uncertain.

Iran said the number of missiles it fired on Tuesday matched the number of bombs dropped by the US, and that any future US attacks would also meet retaliation, in comments widely interpreted as an indication Tehran was not planning any further action at this stage.

The statement from Iran’s Supreme National Security Council also noted the attack on the US base took place away from populated areas and posed no threat to Qatar, “our friendly and brotherly country”.

With Reuters, AP